Although I was first drawn into Feist's work through the Betrayal at Krondor video game in the mid-90s, I now recognize that the Riftwar Legacy is a very weak series by Feist's normal standards. If you were a fan of the game Return to Krondor or if you are just a Riftwar junkie, you might enjoy revisiting some familiar characters. Tear of the Gods is just plain awful. Unlike Krondor the Betrayal which was based on a great video game, Tear is an awful book based on a lackluster video game.

This is not representative of Raymond Feist's work. Do yourself a favor and read the Magician books, Silverthorn, and A Darkness at Sethanon before you start the Krondor Riftwar Legacy series. If you fall in love with Midkemia, then read every other book that Feist has written before stooping to this. Only the most devoted fans will appreciate it and even then it will be hard to tolerate the flaws. As a die-hard Feist fan, it's almost hard to believe that the same man wrote this book.

This book, like all of the Riftwar Legacy novels, is a painful read of scripted, wooden characters that have absolutely no life to them. The plots are more like children's books, and everything is extremely predictable. The hero's are heroic, the bad guys are overtly evil, and the action is just as cartoon-like and predictable as anything being shown on Saturday mornings...

It is best to skip this book, and the rest of the Riftwar Legacy along with it, and pretend it doesn't exist when you read the rest of Feist's Midkemia novels.

I said it before, for Kronder: The Betrayal - Feist should stick with
what he knows best, namely writing excellent books, rather than trying to
emulate computer games.

Rather than the well-structured sagas we are used to with Feist (I'm a
long-time fan, having started reading his work in the 80's), this book...
and indeed most of this trilogy...reads exactly as what it is pretending
not to be - a computer game with one ultimate quest, riddled with a
number of smaller side quests...open the magic box in the right sequence,
destroy x-creatures before returning to npc character, etc., etc.

In a nutshell, the priests of Ishap transport a magical gem once every
ten years from a secret location to its mother temple in Rillanon, the
capital of the Kingdom of the Isles in Midkemia. The gem is called the
Tear of the Gods, and is said to allow the gods to hear the prayers of
everyone on Midkemia. Without the Tear, the world would become godless
(considering how many religious wars we have here on Earth, having a
world become godless doesn't seem such a bad thing) and magic might even
fade. Worse, if it fell into the wrong hands, it could be used as a
weapon of unmatched power wielded for unspeakable evil...or some nonsense
like that. Anyway, the ship transporting the gem is attacked and sinks.
The race is then on between James, Jazhara, a monk of Ishap named Solon,
and a guildsman who can raise the ship, named Kendaric, against the evil
necromancer Sidi and his henchman Bear, to recover the Tear. The outcome
will determine whether Midkemia will be plunged into eternal darkness or
continue on its merry way. Given that James appears later in the
Serpentwar saga (as does William) and the Kingdom is still intact, at
least at the start of the Serpentwar saga, it isn't giving much away
telling you that James and William survive this venture, and the Tear is
safely recovered. The how in all of that is the key, then, but I'll leave
you to decide for yourself whether dragging yourself through at least
2 terribly planned and executed books is worth it.

When I first read the book I was very disappointed and genuinely put off
by Feist's work. It took an effort of some will-power to start reading
Talon of the Silver Hawk (first book in the Conclave of Shadows series).
I'm glad I did continue on to Talon, as Feist returns to form. However, I
cannot in good conscience recommend this book or the Riftwar Legacy, as
much as it pains me to say, being a big fan of Feist's work :(

i have all 3 books of the riftwar legacy and am still on the first book. I really enjoy this book as well as other books by feist. This wirter is very gifted. I love Pug, prince arutha,Locklear and the famous jimmy the had. thank you so much for these jems.

God stone sunk.


Or, the bad guys don't like our religion. Can't have that.

A temple raid by forces of your Dark God person sinks an important religious artifact. This leaves a bunch of Kingdom priest types lacking in power. Not so much of a problem for their opposition.

So, a bit of Raise the Titanic Stone to be accomplished, which requires the unique skills of a raising from the ocean practitioner, as well as your usual cast of Midkemian heroes and adventurers to be found in the earlier books in this series.